1st Friday – January 5

Abundant Life Gallery “Random Musings,” prints by Diana Bendixen, 6-9pm. Art Upstairs Recent additions to the “Historic Downtown Mall” series of paintings by Lois Kannensohn, 6-9pm. BozArt Gallery “Au fil de mon Pinceau,” recent oil and pastel paintings of pears by Anne de Latour Hopper, 6-9pm. Cafe Cubano Work by Jenny Johnson, 6-9pm. Fellini’s #9 “Oil […]

The long and winding road

First Night Virginia celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, and along with great regular acts like Abbey Road, Jay and Morwenna and Uncle Henry’s Favorites, this will be the first year that First Night sponsors a parade through Downtown. Craig Green’s Common Ground Chorus is modeled on Ubuntu: a belief that singing in harmony celebrates […]

Capsule reviews of films playing in town

Apocalypto (R, 138 minutes) For the follow-up to his worldwide smash, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson has chosen this dark adventure drama set in the fading days of the Mayan empire. The story centers around Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood), a young man chosen for human sacrifice who flees the kingdom to avoid his […]

All I want

The presents are all wrapped and under the tree. You still have time to go out and hear some music. At the Twisted Branch Tea Bazaar, Sarah White

‘Twas the week before Christmas

“Home for the Holidays” Friday 8pm, CBS Even in death Dave Thomas is making the world a better place. I’m not talking about Wendy’s’ Jalapeno Cheddar Double Melt or the Vanilla Frosty (although, now that I think about it, those count too). This special is sponsored by the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, which Thomas—an […]

Capsule reviews of films playing in town

Apocalypto (R, 138 minutes) For the follow-up to his worldwide smash, The Passion of the Christ, Mel Gibson has chosen this dark adventure drama set in the fading days of the Mayan empire. The story centers around Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood), a young man chosen for human sacrifice who flees the kingdom to avoid his […]

Station to station

If you’re a gamer—or, more pointedly, one the friends and family members who’ll be buying gifts for one in the next three weeks—you might be pardoned for feeling like one of the hapless burglars in Home Alone whose face just met the business end of MacCaulay Culkin’s swinging paint can trap.

Box your ears

It used to be that when Christmas holidays approached, many in the music industry celebrated the success of the CD box set. It was the gift that said both, “I tried to be more thoughtful than a gift certificate,” and “I knew you would never spend 60 bucks on yourself, so Merry Christmas.” In the […]

Heartbreak hotel

“The Lost Room”Tuesday 7pm, Sci Fi Channel Look at little Sci Fi go! A couple of years ago, the cable net was a dumping ground for “Stargate” repeats and crappy made-for-TV movies starring, like, Kari Wuhrer. Now thanks to cult hits like “Battlestar Galactica” and “Who Wants to Be a Super-Hero?” it’s getting some cred […]

Have guitar, will travel

One of the main reasons to be in a band (apart from the money and the girls, of course) is the opportunity to travel and play gigs in interesting places. As our friend Dave Grant used to put it, to go drinking in different languages. Jodie Foster’s loss is Bill Gates’ gain when Big Ray […]